Ελληνική ιστορία και προϊστορία

Ελληνική ιστορία και προϊστορία
Ελληνική ιστορία και προϊστορία

Κυριακή 13 Σεπτεμβρίου 2015

Menes(Minos) Narmer - The Greek first pharaoh of Prehistoric Egypt 3.200BC

Narmer was an ancient Egyptian king of theEarly Dynastic Period. Probably the successor to the Protodynastic kings Scorpionbband/or Ka, unifier of Egypt and founder of the First Dynasty, therefore the first king of a unified Egypt. The identity of Narmer is the subject of ongoing debate, although mainstream Egyptological consensus identifies Narmer with the First Dynasty
pharaoh Menes, who is also credited with the unification of Egypt, as the first pharaoh. This conclusion is based on the Narmer Palette which shows Narmer as the unifier of Egypt and the two necropolis seals from the necropolis of Abydos that show him as the first king of the First Dynasty. Narmer has been cited as the earliest person whose name is known, though Iry-Hor likely lived two generations before Narmer. The approximate date of Narmer/Menes is mostly estimated as close to the 31st or 32nd century BCE, although recent Egyptological literature comprises estimates of anywhere between the 34th and the 30th centuries BCE. Menes (Μήνης) was an ancient Egyptian pharaoh of the early dynastic period, credited by classical tradition with having united Upper and Lower Egypt, and as the founder of the first dynasty (Dynasty I).
Mainstream Egyptological consensus identifies Menes with the protodynastic  pharaoh
 Narmer or first dynasty Hor-Aha. Both pharaohs are credited with the unification of Egypt, to different degrees by various authorities. By 500 BC mythical and exaggerated claims had made Menes a cultural hero, and most of what is known of him comes from a much later time.
Ancient tradition ascribed to Menes the honor of having united Upper and Lower Egypt into a single kingdom, and becoming the first pharaoh of Dynasty I. However, his name does not appear on extant pieces of the Royal Annals (Cairo Stone andPalermo Stone), which is a now-fragmentary king's list that was carved onto a stela during the Fifth dynasty. He typically appears in later sources as the first human ruler of Egypt, directly inheriting the throne from the god Horus. He also appears in other, much later, king's lists, always as the first human pharaoh of Egypt. Menes also appears in demotic novels of the Graeco-Roman Period, demonstrating that, even that late, he was regarded as important figure. Menes was seen as a founding figure for much of the history of Ancient Egypt, similar to Romulus in Ancient Rome. Manetho records that Menes "led the army across the frontier and won great glory". Manetho associates the city of Thinis with the first dynasties (Dynasty I and Dynasty II) and, in particular, Menes, a "Thinite" or native of Thiniss. Herodotus contradicts Manetho in stating that Menes founded the city of Memphis as his capital after diverting the course of the River Nile through the construction of a dyke. Manetho ascribes the building of Memphis to Menes' son, Athothis,  and calls no pharaohs earlier than Dynasty III "Memphite". Herodotus and Manetho's stories of the foundation of Memphis are probably later inventions: in 2012 a relief mentioning the visit of Memphis by Iry-Hor --a predynastic ruler of Upper Egypt reigning before Namer-- was discovered in Sinai, indicating that the city was already in existence in the early32nd century BC. Diodorus Siculus stated that Menes had introduced the worship of the gods and the practice of sacrifice as well as a more elegant and luxurious style of living. For this latter invention, Menes' memory was dishonoured by the Dynasty XXIV pharaoh Tefnakht, and Plutarch mentions a pillar at Thebes on which was inscribed an imprecation against Menes as the introducer of luxury. In Pliny's account, Menes was credited with being the inventor of writing in Egypt. According to Manetho, Menes reigned for 62 years and was killed by a hippopotamus. Some scholars assert that the name of the king Minos who ruled in ancient Crete, (Minoan civilization) is derived from Menes just as the names Tsar and Kaiser are derived from Caesar. In Greek mythology, Minos (Μίνως) is a king of Crete, son of Zeus andEuropa. Every nine years, he made King Aegeus pick seven young boys and seven young girls to be sent to Daedalus' creation, the labyrinth, to be eaten by the Minotaur. After his death, Minos became a judge of the dead in the underworld. The Minoan civilization of Crete has been named after him by the archaeologist Arthur Evans. By his wife, Pasiphaë (or some say Crete), he fathered Ariadne,Androgeus, Deucalion, Phaedra, Glaucus, Catreus,Acacallis and Xenodice. By a nymph, Pareia, he had four sons, Eurymedon, Nephalion, Chryses and Philolaus, who were killed by Heracles in revenge for the murder of the latter's two companions; and by Dexithea, one of the Telchines, he had a son called Euxanthius. By Androgeneia of Phaestus he had Asterion, who commanded the Cretan contingent in the war between Dionysus and the Indians. Also given as his children are Euryale, possibly the mother of Orion with Poseidon, and Pholegander , eponym of the island Pholegandros. Minos, along with his brothers, Rhadamanthys and Sarpedon, was raised by king Asterion (or Asterius) of Crete. When Asterion died, his throne was claimed by Minos who banished Sarpedon and, according to some sources, Rhadamanthys too. Minos searched for Daedalus by traveling from city to city asking a riddle; he presented a spiral seashell and asked for it to be strung all the way through. When he reached Camicus, Sicily, King Cocalus, knowing Daedalus would be able to solve the riddle, fetched the old man. He tied the string to an ant, which walked through the seashell, stringing it all the way through. Minos then knew Daedalus was in the court of King Cocalus and demanded he be handed over. Cocalus managed to convince him to take a bath first; then Cocalus' daughters and Daedalus, with Minos trapped in the bath, scalded him to death with boiling water. After his death, Minos became a judge of the dead in Hades
 together with Aeacus and Rhadamanthus. Rhadamanthus judged the souls of Asians, Aeacus judged Europeans, and Minos had the deciding vote. Manetho (Μανέθων) was an Egyptian historian and priest from Sebennytos who lived during the Ptolemaic era, approximately during the 3rd century BC. Manetho wrote the Aegyptiaca (History of Egypt). His work is of great interest to Egyptologists, and is often used as evidence for the chronology of the reigns of pharaohs. The earliest and only surviving reference to Manetho's Aegyptiaca is that of the Jewish historian
 Josephus in his work "Against Apion". The Aegyptiaca (ἈΑιγυπτιακά, Aiguptiaka), the "History of Egypt", may have been Manetho's largest work, and certainly the most important. It was organised chronologically and divided into three volumes, and his division of rulers into dynasties was an innovation. However, he did not use the term in the modern sense, by bloodlines, but rather, introduced new dynasties whenever he detected some sort of discontinuity whether geographical (Dynasty IV from Memphis, Dynasty V from Elephantine), or genealogical (especially in Dynasty I, he refers to each successive Pharaoh as the "son" of the previous to define what he means by "continuity"). Within the superstructure of a genealogical table, he fills in the gaps with substantial narratives of the Pharaonic kings. Some have suggested that Aegyptiaca was written as a competing account to Herodotus' Histories, to provide a national history for Egypt that did not exist before. From this perspective, Against Herodotus may have been an abridged version or just a part of Aegyptiaca that circulated independently. Unfortunately, neither survives in its original form today. Manetho's methods involved the use of king-lists to provide a structure for his history. There were precedents to his writing available in Egypt (plenty of which have survived to this day), and his Hellenistic and Egyptian background would have been influential in his writing. Josephus records him admitting to using "nameless oral tradition" (1.105) and "myths and legends" (1.229) for his account, and there is no reason to doubt this, as admissions of this type were common among historians of that era. His familiarity with Egyptian legends is indisputable, but how he came to know Greek is more open to debate. He must have been familiar with Herodotus, and in some cases, he even attempted to synchronize Egyptian history with Greek (for example, equating King Memnon with Amenophis, and Armesis with Danaos). This suggests he was also familiar with the Greek Epic Cycle (for which the Ethiopian Memnon is slain by Achilles during the Trojan War) and the history of Argos (in Aeschylus's Suppliants). However, it has also been suggested that these were later interpolations, particularly when the epitome was being written, so these guesses are at best tentative. At the very least, he wrote in fluent Koinê Greek.
Πηγη: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Menes#History
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minos#The_mythological_Minos
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narmer
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manetho#Aegyptiaca

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